Busted: hidden camera unravels public service compensation claim

Public servant Glenn Atkinson said his job had left him in a terrible state.

The Finance Department official allegedly told a doctor in September 2014 that his work-related repetitive strain injuries were so bad, he could do little more than sit at home watching TV, leaving the house only for medical appointments.

Private detectives using hidden cameras have sunk the workers' comp claim of a Canberra public servant.

Which was strange, because when private eyes hired by workers' compensation authority Comcare secretly filmed Mr Atkinson about a month later, he looked quite active.

The film shows the public servant playing a poker machine in a club, going on a fishing trip with friends where he helped lift a kayak from a trailer, picked up an esky containing several cans of beer and ice, even carrying a shovel a short distance, then using it to kill a fish.

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He had been off work and claiming compensation since early 2011.

After viewing the video, one of Mr Atkinson's doctors said there was a "considerable discrepancy" between his reported symptoms and his activities on film, while another one said it "appeared paradoxical".

Now, after losing a legal bid to keep his workers' compensation payments, Mr Atkinson is in the sights of Comcare's fraud investigators.

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal threw out Mr Atkinson's claim for compensation, but stopped short of finding the public servant lied to his doctors or exaggerated the severity of his condition.

In his judgment, Tribunal Senior Member James Popples noted that Mr Atkinson disputed the report in which he allegedly told John Talbot in September 2014 that he rarely left the house.

The consultant orthopaedic surgeon, after watching the private detectives' video, wrote the footage "indicated very graphically that the allegations made by Mr Atkinson to me about his supposed upper limb disability were greatly exaggerated and frankly untruthful".

But Dr Talbot died about a year ago, and could not give evidence to the tribunal.

In light of the inability of Mr Atkinson's legal team to cross-examine Dr Talbot, Dr Popple made no findings on whether the public servant lied to his doctors.

"I have found that things that Mr Atkinson is seen doing on the surveillance video are inconsistent with him then suffering from the effects of his accepted injuries," Dr Popple wrote.

"But I make no findings about whether those things are also inconsistent with what Mr Atkinson told his doctors."

Mr Atkinson argued his injuries had been caused by his work at Finance, which involved a lot of repetitive squeezing and holding heavy files, and that he had undergone surgery on his right arm and was waiting for an operation on the left one.

Orthopaedic surgeon Chris Roberts diagnosed Mr Atkinson as suffering compartment syndrome, a form of RSI, in his arms on the basis of his history and an examination, with Dr Roberts noting a delay in diagnosis had probably delayed the public servant's recovery.

But Robert Still, a sports physician who also gave evidence at the tribunal hearing, disagreed with Dr Roberts's diagnosis, saying the measurements of Mr Atkinson's compartment pressure were only marginally elevated at best and possibly not elevated at all.

Comcare also asked Dr Popple for guidance on whether it should pursue a fraud investigation against Mr Atkinson but the tribunal senior member declined, leaving the insurer to make its own decision.

"I have made a finding which resolves the issues in this review," Dr Popple wrote.

"I am not required to do more than that, and I do not think that I should in this case."